


Five Times Clint And Melinda Were The Bane Of Coulson’s Existence, And One Time Fury Finally Put His Foot Down

by queen_of_troy



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Minor Arson, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Slight Vandalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-26
Updated: 2015-05-26
Packaged: 2018-04-01 08:45:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4013236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queen_of_troy/pseuds/queen_of_troy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Keeping Agents Clint Barton and Melinda May from separately pulling too many pranks was already enough of a headache for Coulson. Then they realised they had a kindred spirit in each other…</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Clint And Melinda Were The Bane Of Coulson’s Existence, And One Time Fury Finally Put His Foot Down

**Author's Note:**

> Because let’s face it, pre-Bahrain Melinda May and young Clint Barton would have been total prankster buddies.  
> By queenoftroy

**1.**

He wouldn’t say it out loud, but Coulson was quite pleased with himself.

Apart from the minor knife wound he was helping Natasha bandage, neither the agents nor any civilians had been injured, the bomb had been safely disabled and the terrorists who had planted it were all in shackles. Fury had said they could stay the night in the luxurious hotel they’d prevented from being blown up, and Coulson was quite looking forward to relaxing by the pool.

This last he did voice to Natasha, who snorted.

“Boring. I’m hitting the bar, they look like they’ve got some pretty sweet Scotch.”

“Fine, just keep an eye on Barton, would you? I don’t like the idea of him and May alone in a hotel room getting bored.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep ‘em both busy. You go have your relax by the pool, I guess putting out those flames entitles you to a night off babysitting.”

Coulson looked offended.

“They weren’t just  _flames,_  it was easily a small fire, and if I hadn’t put it out when I did the whole curtain could’ve gone up.”

“Not to burst your bubble or anything, but I think we’d’ve been okay. Like I told Barton, velvet doesn’t go up that easily.”

An odd strangled noise made her glance up; the look on Coulson’s face was worse than when she’d threatened to rip up his card collection.

“You did  _what?_ ”

“Velvet’s practically inflammable, I told him even if he was trying it probably wouldn’t -”

“You told  _Barton_  that it was practically impossible for him to  _set something on fire_?”

Natasha paled.

“Oh,  _shi_ -”

The piercing wail of the fire alarm and immediate downpour of water from the sprinklers cut her off.

Coulson bolted into the corridor and down to the next room; as he burst through the door his foot caught on something sitting just inside the doorway and he went flying face first into the carpet. He looked up and saw Melinda and Clint both sitting cross-legged on the bed, happily watching the flames consuming the curtains.

“Inflammable, my ass,” Clint said gleefully, not seeming to mind that his handiwork was beginning to be extinguished by the sprinklers now that he’d proved his point.

Coulson sat up with a groan and looked over his shoulder; a small suitcase had been carefully placed just inside the door. He looked back at Melinda, who glanced at him, smirking.

“Told you he’d trip,” she said to Clint, who looked over at Coulson and chuckled. Melinda lifted the fire extinguisher in her lap and looked at Coulson, her smile far too mischievous for his comfort.

“Well,” she said, swinging her legs over the side of the bed, “since we don’t need this for the curtains…”

Coulson jumped to his feet with a yell of panic, but he only made it halfway to the door before the jet of foam hit him square in the back.

**2.**

Melinda looked at the gathering crowd of new recruits and sighed. Most of them looked like they’d collapse after a five-mile hike; she was really going to have to go back to basics with them.

“You got sucked into babysitting too, huh?”

Melinda smiled as she turned and saw Clint’s head sticking through the gym door; behind him another crowd of recruits shuffled nervously.

“Yeah,” she called over to him, making sure her voice was loud enough for everyone in the gym to hear, “guess they really want them broken in, huh?”

“Looks like it,” Clint replied with an evil grin. “Try not to put too many of them in hospital, you know how shirty human resources can get over that.”

“Right, cause you’ve never been hauled up for “accidentally” embedding your arrows in – how many body parts was it?”

“Hey, come on, it wasn’t  _that_  bad, it’s not like the kid  _died_  or anything. Anyway, I’ll be careful this time.”

Clint headed off towards the range, several of his followers looking distinctly paler than before. As Melinda turned to her own group of rookies she noted with satisfaction that many of them already looked distinctly pale, and some like they wanted to run away.

“Alright, newbies,” she said, kicking her shoes off and stepping onto the mat, “who’s first?”

~

Clint’s exhausted-looking recruits streamed past Melinda as she made her way up to the range that afternoon. Most looked shell-shocked or seemed to be reconsidering their choice in signing up; a few were openly weeping – although not as many as in her group, she noted with a smirk of pride.

Clint was sitting up on the railing of the viewing gallery, watching as several cleaners attempted to pry stray arrows out of the walls.

“So, you get any quitters?” she called up. He shook his head ruefully.

“Nah. Got ten criers, though – oh, and avoid those red cones, one kid crapped himself pretty bad when I almost pierced his ear for him.”

Melinda laughed and nodded. “Nice,” she said, “but not as good as fourteen criers and a kid who didn’t know when to give up with his arm broken in three different places – and I think his friend threw up when she heard his wrist snap.” Clint laughed; she grinned and gave him an over-the-top bow as he applauded her.

“ _May!_ ” Coulson was standing in the doorway, his tie loosened and a vein popping in his temple. “Would you care to explain to me why a delegation of rookies just showed up in my office  _begging_  to be reassigned to a training group not run by, and I quote, ‘that awful woman who broke Gregg’s arm, oh, god, please, anyone but her’??”

**3.**

“Barton?”

Clint cracked open an eye and squinted up at the speaker. “Go punch a Level 9 in the face, May, I’m trying to nap here.”

“Oh, for god’s sakes, that was  _one_  time – anyway, does whoever’s desk that is know you’re napping on top of their paperwork?”

Clint groaned and sat up.

“I was gonna move when they came back from their lunch break,” he protested. Melinda rolled her eyes.

“It’s 3:15, how long of a lunch break do they have? Or are they just scared you’re gonna put an arrow in their eyeball if they try and make you move?”

He glared at her. “What’s your point?”

“My point is, Coulson wants you in his office 5 minutes ago – something about the toilets on the third floor?”

Clint winced and jumped off the desk.

“Don’t suppose there’s any chance he’s gonna believe it was an accident?” he asked hopefully as he followed Melinda out into the corridor. She looked at him, not even needing to raise her eyebrow to make his shoulders slump. “Okay, fine, can’t blame a guy for asking,” he grumbled.

“Look, I’m not saying that spraying the toilets with rainbow glitter glue wasn’t genius, but even you have to admit that writing “CAW CAW, MOTHERFUCKERS” in the resultant mess kind of negates any claim that it got there by accident.”

“Worth it,” Clint sighed as they got into the lift.

Two floors from Coulson’s office, a crowd of agents spilled into the lift laughing and shoving at each other; by the look – and smell – of them they’d just gotten out of the gym. Not particularly knowing any of them except by sight, Melinda ignored them – until one particularly large guy stumbled backwards from a push from his friend and knocked right into her.

“Hey!” she said angrily, pushing him back towards his friend. “Watch it!”

“Sorry, sweetheart,” the guy chuckled, patting her shoulder without even looking at her.

Clint instinctively seized her arm; after a pleading look from him, Melinda contented herself with growling,

“Don’t “sweetheart” me, “sorry”’s just fine.”

The agent gave her an amused look. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, glancing at his friend with a snigger, “was that  _demeaning_? Am I being  _disrespectful_?”

Melinda clenched her fists as chuckles ran through the group of – all male, she now realised – agents.

“Shut it, asswipe,” Clint said sharply, inwardly sighing with relief as the lift reached their floor.

“Ooh, look at the tough guy, sticking up for his girlfriend.” The doors slid open. “You think you’re tough, tough guy?”

“Yeah, actually, I do. Luckily for you, I got somewhere to be.”

He started gently ushering May towards the door and the asshole snorted.

“Like you two pussies could take me.”

Clint and Melinda simultaneously stopped dead and turned to face the crowded lift.

“Say that again?” Melinda asked with an unnervingly sweet smile. The asshole hit the “door open” button and stepped forwards.

“I said, you couldn’t take me if –”

The arrogant smile quickly left his face as Melinda’s knee landed squarely in his crotch.

~

Coulson looked up from the pile of paperwork on his desk as a cacophony of yells and the unmistakeable sound of people getting punched drifted into his office from the corridor. He was already pinching the bridge of his nose in an effort to ward off a frustration headache before the door burst open and a panicked underling ran in.

“Agent Coulson – they – we –”

“I know,” he sighed, standing up and striding past the underling. He entered the corridor, dodged a flying body and regarded the scene before him impassively. Several bodies littered the floor; some of the more conscious ones were being dealt a lesson in staying down in the form of roundhouse kicks to the head from Melinda, whilst Clint appeared to be trying to grapple two agents in a chokehold at once.

Coulson waited patiently until the last antagonist dropped to the floor and stayed there, and interrupted Clint and Melinda’s high-five with a pointed clearing of his throat.

“Give me one good reason not to put you both on desk duty for the next six months.”

Clint and Melinda looked at each other.

“They started it?”

**4.**

“I don’t know if we should be doing this,” one rookie whispered to his friend as they crowded into the huge laundry. Melinda’s head snapped around and they quailed under her gaze.

“Wearing our country’s colours on the anniversary of S.H.I.E.L.D’s foundation is a proud tradition,” she said seriously, carefully ignoring the muffled snort from Clint. “If you don’t have adequate clothing, it is our duty as agents to help you get some.”

“But… dyeing our uniforms?” the doubter said. “Isn’t that a little… extreme?”

“I’m sorry,” Melinda said, “does the word “tradition” mean  _nothing_ to you?” Clint quickly moved out of the rookies’ line of sight, unable to keep a straight face. “You’ve  _sworn_  to serve this institution and all that it stands for, and yet you won’t do this one simple thing to honour its history?” Clint buried his face in the pile of uniforms he held; none of the rookies looked at him, their eyes all fixed on Melinda’s stony face in terrified awe. “I mean, if you really care so  _little_  –”

“I’m sorry!” the rookie squeaked. Melinda raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t mean to sound disrespectful, I just wasn’t sure if this was authorised…”

“ _Authorised?_ Agent Barton and I are Level Six agents, what more authorisation do you need? Do you want us to call Agent Coulson in the middle of his  _very_ important meeting with Director Fury because some rookies who haven’t even made Level One yet –”

“No! No, not at all!” The rookie was quaking as Melinda eyed him suspiciously, but his shuddering was nothing compared to Clint’s; the assassin was almost crying with mirth.

“Hmm. So you’re going to help Agent Barton and I –” she shot Clint a look, and he wiped his eyes “– without any further complaints?”

“Absolutely!”

“Hmm.” She shot the rookie a final suspicious glare for good measure as Clint, who had managed to pull himself together, moved back to the front of the group.

“All right then,” he said, dumping his armful of black uniforms into a large washing tub. “Everyone put the uniforms you’ve gathered in here. You lot are on bleaching duty – and you, you, you and…  _you_  can come help me prepare the dye…”

~

The next day, Coulson had barely stepped through the door before he saw the first results of Clint and May’s “patriotism”. The effectiveness of the dye jobs varied considerably – several rookies were striding proudly around in bright red, white and blue-striped training gear, whilst a group huddled in the corner looked like they were going to cry; the bleach had not fully taken hold and the red and blue dyes had mixed in their uniforms, creating a frankly horrifying greyish-maroon blur.

Coulson didn’t have the heart to yell at any of them for being dumb enough to fall for it, but as his eye fell on Melinda and Clint almost doubled over as they surveyed their handiwork from a balcony he made a mental note to ask Fury for a pay rise.

**5.**

“I’m bored.”

Melinda looked up with a grin at Clint’s voice, gratefully tossing the mission prep Coulson had left her with aside.

“Oh, thank god, I thought I was going to be stuck reading that until the end of time.”

Clint hopped up onto the table, looking around the empty boardroom Melinda had occupied as though searching for inspiration.

“So, whatcha wanna do? I hear they’re throwing a party for Johnson up in Human Resources, if we liberate some of the balloons –”

“No,” Melinda said ruefully, “we’ll get landed in desk jobs for sure if we do anything involving launching projectiles at rookies.”

Clint sighed. “True.”

They both thought for a moment, and then Melinda’s face lit up.

“How about we go old-school?”

“What d’you mean?”

“Well, I happened to be looking through Victoria’s desk the other day, and I found something  _very_  interesting…”

~

“ _Coulson!_ ”

Coulson groaned internally. He’d already had a long day; he wasn’t sure if he had enough energy to deal with the obviously furious Victoria Hand standing in his office doorway.

“What is it, Victoria?”

“ _Guess_.”

_Oh, god._  “Barton or May?” he asked hopefully.

“Since it’s in both the women’s and men’s bathrooms, I’m going to have to go ahead and say  _both_.”

“ _What’s_  in all the bathrooms? Not more glitter –”

“No.  _Lube_. The stuff’s everywhere, on the seats, the taps, the door handles –”

“Wait, wait,” Coulson held up his hand with a frown. “That’s  _it?_  A bit of lube on the seats and handles isn’t exactly –”

“It’s not the lube.”

Coulson suddenly realised that Victoria was  _blushing_ , her face pink enough to match the streaks in her hair.

“They… spray-painted something on the walls,” she said through clenched teeth. “About where they got the stuff.”

Coulson did his best to keep a straight face.

“Oh,” he managed. “I take it you were mentioned…?”

Victoria pulled out her phone and slammed it down on Coulson’s desk. He picked it up, and saw a photograph of what appeared to be the fourth floor women’s bathrooms – with what was unmistakeably Melinda’s handwriting sprayed across the walls in bright red paint, spelling out:

_Today’s prank comes to you courtesy of Agent Hand’s bottom left desk drawer :)_ _  
_

He looked up at Victoria, who was almost shaking with anger, fists clenched as she rested them on the desk.

“I want them both grounded from active duty,” she spat.

“Can’t,” Coulson said apologetically. “May’s heading to Chile in two days, and I’ve just had orders from Fury to dispatch Barton to Mongolia as soon as possible.”

“You can’t let them get away with this!” Victoria almost yelled, before collecting herself and lowering her voice. “Coulson, this is the kind of behaviour we let slide from rookies who don’t know any better. They’re  _Level Six_  agents, if you don’t make an example of them –”

“I understand, Victoria, and the second they get back from their respective missions I will be disciplining them both.”

“Good.”

As Victoria took her phone and headed for the door, Coulson couldn’t resist leaning back and asking, “Did they really get the stuff from your –”

“ _THAT IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!!_ ”

**+1.**

_Knock knock._

Fury glanced up from his computer, frowning. He wasn’t expecting anyone until the debriefing he was supposed to run at three, and people didn’t tend to turn up at his office unannounced.

“Come in?”

The door cracked open, and a nervous-looking woman stuck her head in. “Um, we’re here for the meeting?”

Fury looked past her; there were several other desk monkey types standing behind her.

“I don’t have any meetings scheduled,” he said sharply. She squeaked and withdrew, but Fury could see the silhouettes of her and her friends lingering behind the clouded glass, and more people appeared to be arriving. He stood up and strode over to the door, yanking it open; a quickly growing crowd of agents was amassing outside his door, whispering amongst themselves.

“What the  _hell_  is going on?” he demanded loudly, making several of the agents nearest him jump and scuttle backwards a few steps.

“We, uh, we’re here for the meeting,” one agent ventured.

“What meeting?” he snapped.

“An email was sent out 10 minutes ago ordering all agents to report to your office for an urgent meeting,” Coulson’s slightly muffled voice echoed from the back of the crowd.

“Well,  _I_ sure as hell didn’t –”

Fury’s phone buzzed. He flipped it open.

“What?”

“Um, Director Fury, this is the front desk, I have a delivery guy with like twenty pizzas insisting that he’s got an order for, and I quote, ‘The boss man with the eye-patch.’”

“Wh– just get security to get him out of here!” Fury snapped, hanging up. “Now look,” he said to the still-growing crowd, “I don’t know where that email came from, but I can assure you –”

His phone rang again.

“Yes?”

“Uh, Director –”

“Oh, for the love of god, if the guy won’t go just pay for the damn pizzas and pass them around the offices –”

“It’s not that. There’s, ah, there’s two men here to see you.”

“What??”

“They’re wearing trench coats and asking for the “bad birthday boy”…”

Coulson had managed to elbow his way to the front of the crowd, and Fury hung up, fixing him with his best glare.

“Coulson, what in the  _hell_  –”

“I think I know what’s going on here, sir,” Coulson said apologetically. “The agents you’re supposed to debrief at three…”

Fury closed his eye. “Don’t tell me,” he said, “May and Barton?”

~

Half an hour, when the crowd had finally been cleared (and the strippers and pizza man sent on their way), Fury leaned back in his chair and regarded the two agents standing in front of him. For two people in a whole world of trouble, they weren’t doing a very good job of looking contrite.

“Agent Coulson tells me that you two have been causing a  _lot_  of unnecessary paperwork lately.”

A brief smirk flickered across both agents’ faces; in the corner, Coulson winced as Fury barked,

“I’m sorry, is something  _funny_? Because the last I looked, being the cause of  _five_ bathroom remodelling jobs in less than twelve months is  _not_  something to laugh about!”

“Sorry, sir,” Melinda said quietly.

“Well unfortunately, Agent May,  _sorry_  isn’t quite going to cut it any more. Every time you two get pulled up for something like this, you promise it won’t happen again – and then, surprise surprise, it  _does_. You’ve both proved that you can’t be left alone without getting up to something, and from now on, I’m not going to give you a chance to. There is now an agent in human resources whose  _job_  it is to ensure that you two are never both in this hub at the same time again, and if it a situation should arise where it absolutely can’t be avoided, he will be assigned to keep you from interacting with each other.”

Clint and Melinda both began to protest, but Fury yelled over their voices, “I don’t want to hear it! If you two do anything to the bathrooms again it’ll be cheaper to pay for the refurb ourselves than have the damn insurance premiums go up again!”

Melinda and Clint both stared sulkily at the floor.

“Count yourselves lucky you’re both such damn good agents,” Fury snapped, “if you weren’t you’d be looking at an indefinite stretch stuck at a desk in some corner of admin. Now Barton, you can get your ass down to the range and put the rookies through their paces – and if I get one single complaint from any of them on your teaching methods, so help me god you  _will_  spend every day until retirement on graveyard shift at the Fridge.” Clint spun around and stalked off wordlessly, not even bothering to conceal his scowl. “May, Hand’s waiting in her office to brief you on your next assignment. Coulson will escort you.”

Melinda managed a nod and a tight, “Yes, sir,” but her expression wasn’t much lighter than Clint’s as she left, her definition of “being escorted” seeming to consist of striding along at twice her normal pace so that Coulson was forced to scurry along in almost a jog to keep up.

When he was absolutely certain they were out of sight and earshot, Fury looked down at the file of reports Coulson had given him and began to chuckle.

“Lube and  _glitter_ ,” he muttered to himself with a smile. “How in the hell do they come up with this shit?”

**Author's Note:**

> This was heavily inspired by a post from the wonderful Prim regionsofkindness on tumblr (http://regionsofkindness.tumblr.com/post/85035532486/you-know-who-else-melinda-may-has-likely-worked)  
> Not going to lie, this was quite fun to write, so if anyone wants something in a similar vein feel free to message me a request here or on tumblr (queen-of-troy) :)


End file.
